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New Jersey teen sues classmate for allegedly creating, sharing fake AI nudes
A New Jersey teen is suing a classmate for allegedly creating and sharing AI-generated pornographic images of herself and other classmates.
A male classmate used an “AI application or website” to alter photos of the 15-year-old, who is identified only as Jane Doe because she is a minor, and other female classmates at Westfield High School, according to a federal lawsuit, filed in the United States District Court District of New Jersey. The photos were initially shared on Instagram.
In all of the photos, Jane Doe and the other girls were clothed, but the AI application digitally removed the clothing and created new images that made the girls appear nude. Their faces remained easily identifiable, the lawsuit said.
“These nude photos of Jane Doe and other minor girls are virtually indistinguishable from real, unaltered photos,” the lawsuit said.
The classmate who allegedly made the images then shared the edited photos with fellow classmates and “possibly others,” the lawsuit said, using the Internet and Snapchat to distribute them during the summer of 2023. Snapchat’s parent company, Snap, told CBS News that their policies prohibit the sharing of such images, and that their app cannot be used to create them.
“We have zero tolerance for the sexual exploitation of any member of our community,” Snap said in a statement.
Jane Doe and her family learned about the images in October 2023, when her parents, who were also not identified in the lawsuit, were contacted by her Union County high school. The school’s assistant principal said that officials were aware of the images and had confirmed that Jane Doe was a “victim,” the suit said. According to the assistant principal, a student had called into the school office to alert officials about seeing nude photos of Jane Doe.
The defendant’s father also reached out to Jane Doe’s parents, according to the lawsuit. Jane Doe’s parents “immediately cooperated with an investigation launched by the Westfield Police Department,” but charges were not pursued because the information gathered by school officials could not be used in the investigation.
In addition the “defendant and other potential witnesses failed to cooperate with, speak to, or provide access to their electronic devices to law enforcement.” Law enforcement was not able to determine how widely the photos had been shared, or ensure that the photos were deleted and not shared further, the lawsuit said.
“Victims of child and nonconsensual pornography in which their actual faces appear, including Jane Doe, are not only harmed and violated by the creation of such images, but they are also haunted for the rest of their lives by knowing that they were and likely will continue to be exploited for the sexual gratification of others and that, absent court intervention, there is an everlasting threat that such images will be circulated in the future,” the lawsuit said.
Jane Doe “suffered and will continue to suffer substantial” reputational and psychological harm because of the photos, the lawsuit said, and she has dealt with “substantial emotional distress, mental anguish, anxiety, embarrassment, shame, humiliation” and “injuries and harms for which there is no adequate remedy at law” since learning about the photos.
The lawsuit requested that Jane Doe receive damages of $150,000 for each disclosure of a nude image, compensatory and punitive damages to be determined at trial, and a temporary restraining order or an injunction preventing the defendant from sharing the images or disclosing the identity of Jane Doe and her family. The defendant would be required to transfer all of the images to Jane Doe, and then permanently delete and destroy any copies of the images.
Shane Vogt, a lawyer representing Jane Doe, told CBS News that he hopes the case “is successful and will demonstrate that there is something victims can do to protect themselves from the AI pornography epidemic.”
Several states have passed laws to try to combat the spread of AI-generated pornographic images and criminalize the images – as its usage has soared. In New Jersey, a bill is in the works to ban deepfake pornography and impose a fine, jail time or both on those who share the altered images. President Joe Biden shared an executive order in October, that called for banning the use of generative AI to produce child sexual abuse material or non-consensual pornography.
Britain’s Conservative Party on Saturday elected Kemi Badenoch as its new leader as it tries to rebound from a crushing election defeat that ended 14 years in power.
The first Black woman to lead a major British political party, Badenoch (pronounced BADE-enock) defeated rival lawmaker Robert Jenrick in a vote of almost 100,000 members of the right-of-center Conservatives.
She got 53,806 votes in the online and postal ballot of party members, to Jenrick’s 41,388.
Badenoch replaces former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who in July led the Conservatives to their worst election result since 1832. The Conservatives lost more than 200 seats, taking their tally down to 121.
The new leader’s daunting task is to try to restore the party’s reputation after years of division, scandal and economic tumult, hammer Labour Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s policies on key issues including the economy and immigration, and return the Conservatives to power at the next election, due by 2029.
Alberto Pezzali / AP
“The task that stands before us is tough but simple,” Badenoch said in a victory speech to a roomful of Conservative lawmakers, staff and journalists in London. She said the party’s job was to hold the Labour government to account, and to craft pledges and a plan for government.
Addressing the party’s election drubbing, she said “we have to be honest — honest about the fact that we made mistakes, honest about the fact that we let standards slip.”
“The time has come to tell the truth, to stand up for our principles, to plan for our future, to reset our politics and our thinking, and to give our party, and our country, the new start that they deserve,” Badenoch said.
A business secretary in Sunak’s government, Badenoch was born in London to Nigerian parents and spent much of her childhood in the West African country.
The 44-year-old former software engineer depicts herself as a disruptor, arguing for a low-tax, free-market economy and pledging to “rewire, reboot and reprogram” the British state.
A critic of multiculturalism and self-proclaimed enemy of wokeness, Badenoch has criticized gender-neutral bathrooms and government plans to reduce U.K. carbon emissions. During the leadership campaign she drew criticism for saying that “not all cultures are equally valid,” and for suggesting that maternity pay was excessive.
Tim Bale, professor of politics at Queen Mary University of London, said the Conservative Party was likely to “swing towards the right both in terms of its economic policies and its social policies” under Badenoch.
He predicted Badenoch would pursue “what you might call the boats, boilers and bathrooms strategy …. focusing very much on the trans issue, the immigration issue and skepticism about progress towards net zero.”
Alberto Pezzali / AP
While the Conservative Party is unrepresentative of the country as a whole — its 132,000 members are largely affluent, older white men – its upper echelons have become markedly more diverse.
Badenoch is the Tories’ third female leader, after Margaret Thatcher and Liz Truss, both of whom became prime minister. She’s the second Conservative leader from a non-white background, after Sunak, and the first with African roots. The center-left Labour Party, in contrast, has only ever been led by white men.
In a leadership contest that lasted more than three months, Conservative lawmakers reduced the field from six candidates in a series of votes before putting the final two to the wider party membership.
Both finalists came from the right of the party, and argued they can win voters back from Reform U.K., the hard-right, anti-immigrant party led by populist politician Nigel Farage that has eaten away at Conservative support.
But the party also lost many voters to the winning party, Labour, and to the centrist Liberal Democrats, and some Conservatives worry that tacking right will lead the party away from public opinion.
Starmer’s government has had a rocky first few months in office, beset by negative headlines, fiscal gloom and a plummeting approval rating.
But Bale said that the historical record suggests the odds are against Badenoch leading the Conservatives back to power in 2029.
“It’s quite unusual for someone to take over when a party gets very badly beaten and manage to lead it to election victory,” he said. “However, Keir Starmer did exactly that after 2019. So records are there to be broken.”
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